This weblog was created to act as a platform for the voice of secular pro-democracy activists in and outside Iran who are struggling against the religious dictatorship of the Islamic clerics in Iran.
My favourite quote:
"Evil only prevails when the good stay silent"

Thursday, December 31, 2009

Picture of Moussavi's nephew, Ali, saying farewell to his father on his way to defend the country against Saddam's henchmen.

Saddam couldn't kill him but the death squads of this messianic junta which employ the former pro-Saddam Galloway and pay him £8000 for his Press TV programs, gunned him down in front of his family on Sunday.

Wednesday, December 30, 2009

Thirty years on this revolutionary anthem still motivates us to fight against evil and continue our nation's 100 year struggle for freedom and liberty.

To the sigh suffocated in blood
To the martyrs who have given their lives
We swear to the very last cry
To the shaking tears of the mothers
Our Martyrs!
We Swear that our path will be the same as yours

All forward! With one voice! With one voice!
Long Live Our Beloved Iran

We will continue your path our martyrs until our last breath
We swear in the name of freedom
To the moment that you sacrificed your life
To the hearts that has been torn apart
To the martyrs who have been wrapped in their blood
Our Martyrs
We swear our path will continue yours

Sunday, December 27, 2009

People have cornered these security forces. People ask them 'why do you do this to your people?' and the riot guards ask for forgiveness, 'Bebakhshid' they can be heard to say.

'You are Yazid's - the Khalif against whom the Ashura uprising took place -forces', the woman shouts at them. One of the protesters then reassures them that they will not be beaten up, all they have to do is say Khameneii is a bastard. The woman can then be heard saying 'All you can do is kill your people is it?' and again they plead saying 'Please We are not killers'.

The sooner they join the people, the sooner they will redeem themselves with the people of Iran.

Self hating rich kids at SWP and Pro-Saddam Press TV lackey, George Galloway, himself the 5th richest MP in England will refer to these as 'Affluent North Tehran Kids' kicking the shit out of Baseej thugs :))

AP has confirmed at least three people have been killed so far in Tehran. One of the dead is reported to have been a young girl shot in the back by the Baseej. Pro-regime lackey Ghanbar Naderi - he was fiercely pro-Khatami before - appeared on Aljazeera English this morning, his voice shaking he condemned today's protesters saying they do not have a legal permit and are undermining the judiciary and should not use Ashura for their political purposes :))))))

First footage from today:

First picture of Ashura martyr in Iran

Blood, Smoke, Fire and Defiance on the most symbolic day of uprising against tyranny

Sunday, December 20, 2009

As a successor to Ayatollah Khomeini to be the next Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Montazeri gave up all his privileges when he protested against the massacre of Iranian political prisoners in 1988 and asked for a review of the revolution's failures. Perhaps the most memorable quote remembered by Ayatallah Montazeri, who himself was one of the founders of the Islamic Republic, will be 'The Islamic Republic is neither a Republic nor Islamic'

Saturday, December 19, 2009

It was supposed to have been a day for the regime supporters to publicly display their force. Under the guise of protesting against Green supporters tearing up Ayatollah Khomeini's pictures, they thought they can rally their support after Friday prayer and through their usual rent a crowd techniques gather up a huge crowd. Yet it turned out to be the most damning evidence of the massive collapse amongst the regime's supporters. Even the Shah in his last days had managed to muster a bigger crowd than this. All of the pro-regime media were set to broadcast these images of "huge crowds" they had hoped for. When the crowd in Tehran did not even stretch 300 metres long, the State TV didn't dare to broadcast the pro-government rally live. Pro-regime websites remained unusually muted about the pro-government rally and had to suffice with a few close up pictures and avoid long shots.

Moussavi and Karroubi played their cards brilliantly. First they challenged the authenticity of the images of Ayatollah Khomeini's picture being torn and condemned the repeated showing of the suspicious scene on State TV, then they asked for a permit themselves to protest against this. A double edged sword that baffled the coup administration. If they gave permit for a rally, it would have been yet another opportunity for millions to turn up on the streets, and if they didn't, then so much for their claims that they had been offended by these images. Unable to decide what to do with the request for a permit, the government announced their own rally. Once again Moussavi and Karroubi intelligently called on their supporters to stay away. Even some of those who had attended the Friday prayers refused to join the rally afterwards. The most optimistic estimate of the pro-government supporters rally yesterday is 10,000 in Tehran. More realistic figures are between 5000 to 7000. Where there is no doubt however is that it was a huge public set back for the regime.

As it is rumoured to have been stated in a Supreme National Security Council meeting, the support for the regime has seen a 'velvet collapse'.

Thursday, December 17, 2009

I am posting this video with a translation of what this Hamid Molana is saying to make the English speaking audience understand why we resent such turncoats and sychophants. Hamid Molana, who owes everything he has to a US scholarship he received after the tragic death of his parents was also a chum of another Mahmoud, the playboy party loving Prince Mahmoud Reza Pahlavi and a regular VIP at the Key Club, Tehran discotheque and nightclub visited by the elite prior to the 1979 revolution. He is now Ahmadienjad's personal advisor on international affairs and travels back and forward regularly to the USA, in fact he still lives in the US and still holds his academic posts there.

Here it is, the words of wisdom by Dr. Hamid Molana, US scholar in international relations and policy advisor to Mahmoud Ahmadienjad:

'I have to say it tonight, to my dear compatriots that these riots that they have instigated, these provocations that they have started, these plans that they have designed are doomed to fail, because the people of Iran, the very same people, the 40 million who voted in the ballot box, the people in the countrysides, in the provinces, with the enthusiasm that even surprised the whole world, in all seriousness, never in my entire life, no where in the world did I ever see such a reception and participation.

Many ask me, Mr. Molana why is it that when you say such things they[the US] don't bother you? I want to give an answer here to this, you see I have made many criticisms about America, I still criticise its foreign policy, but never do I want to overthrow its system illegally, [nervous laughter], I never go on the street and take part in an uprising, and no where in my writings have I said I want to return America into a monarchy, to bring back the former king of England and do such things, our regime has such a high status that no other regime has, everyone has presidents, everyone has prime ministers, all have ministers but we have the Supreme Leader and the system of Jurisprudence of the Theologian

We can criticise the government, even the regime, but we can not do an uprising against the regime, we can not cross the red line'

Tuesday, December 15, 2009

Been meaning to write about this but with so much news coming from Iran, this was at the bottom of the pile of lists of things to do. Remember this picture? One of the many victims of the campaign against "thugs and hoodlums" in Iran by the Islamic Republic hooded police. Another blatant abuse of human rights in Iran that the SWP friends of the Islamic Republic chose to ignore.

They didn't just ignore human rights abuses in Iran this time though. The SWP cartoonist Leon Kuhn revamped the facts, as SWP usually do, and reproduced it as a picture of a poor Afghan citizen being abused by American soldiers!http://www.socialistworker.org.uk/art.php?id=19697
and as usual you can't leave any comments on their fact twisting articles.

Saturday, December 12, 2009

I am not generally into poetry but occasionally it does move me, and this footage below recited beautifully by this beautiful Iranian girl on the occasion of the new academic year is one of those rare occasions that one can not remain untouched. We are a nation rich in poetry sadly because so often we have had to resort to it in order to express our feelings under the shadow of dictators. I have done my best to translate it but I fear I may not have done a good job, in which case I hope the genuine feelings of this girl when she describes her generation robbed of happiness and the pain and sorrow felt for the fallen classmates as well as the reactions by the admiring audience compensate for it.

Its raining and autumn is the season,
The sky is spilling with resentment
Its as if the clouds are made to prostrate onto the earth
after the burning received by the summer's branding
The air of school has the scent of the alphabets
and the ringing of the morning bell is sharp and harsh
The punishment of unapproved laughters
and petty fun and amusements
is the loss of our teenage years and
the onslaught of non stop accusations
It is the first day of the school year
and I am reminiscent of the unforgettable memories
of the empty classroom that once held you and I
and the many faded flowers that sat behind these desks
Its autumn and its raining within me
I am a prisoner of my own rage
What a beautiful tomorrow we had dreamed of
and instead how our plans were all destroyed
What an age, what a period of transformation we had envisaged
We had longed for a sign for so long
You and I were of the generation that was never allowed to fly
For we were the captives of the open claws
The very ones that murdered you in front of my own eyes
with its sharp barbs
[applause]
and destroyed all our hopes and aspirations
and separated our hands of friendship from each other

You drank the poisoned chalice
and suddenly were removed from my side
I swear to every drop of the motherly tears
to those immortal thoughts
to every drop of love's blood
to those bravehearts in captivity now
that my heart was torn into one hundred pieces
that from your sorrow my heart received one hundred creases

Tell me though, is there happiness in the place you have gone to?
On the other side of life where you are
have you tasted freedom at last?
Do you remember the teenage years?
Is the love for the motherland still in your head?
[loud applause by the audience]

Tell me in the place you have gone to, are there no more weeds?
Is the axe not the predetermined destiny of the Green trees?
Is there no one there that insults your intelligence ?
Does your pride not get raped where you are now?
[laud applause]
Is there any news of unmarked graves over there?
Do you still hear the cries of mothers there?

Sing with me my co-generation who feels my pains
Sing my song with regret and rue
Its raining and autumn is the season,
The sky is crying rage from this injustice
It is I and a desk which feels lonely without you
and the flowers who have faded in the classroom

Those of you who have been following this blog or Iran news in general for the last year or so may be familiar with Majid Tavakoli's name. He was one of the three students who became known as the 'Polytechnic Three', along with Ahmad Ghassaban and Ehsan Mansouri, students of Tehran Polytechnic who were framed for producing publications that insulted Islam. Nothing of the sort was ever proven and in fact it turned out that the Baseej students had falsified a publication and produced insults against Islam themselves in order to frame the three.

Now Majid Tavakoli is in trouble again. He was arrested during the 7th December protests. This time the security forces wanted to take revenge on him in another vindictive way. Pro-Ahmadinejad news agencies like Fars and IRNA, published pictures of Majid Tavakoli wearing a chador and said he was arrested while trying to escape dressed as a woman in a chador. In their warped minds just to add more venom in their humiliation attempts, they even reported that he was also carrying a woman's handbag.

Apart from the fact that their photoshop touched pictures were extremely amateurish, just look at the thumb facing the wrong direction and the sleeve hanging the wrong way in their photoshop attempt above, they forgot one even more important fact. Our women have shown so much courage and like true lionesses they have been at the forefront of the struggle against this regime for so long, that trying to describe a man as a woman not only is not an insult, it is even a badge of honour that depicts fearlessness. Far from discrediting Majid Tavakoli, the move has boosted his popularity. Whatever they force Majid Tavakoli to do or say in the next coming days will be worthless, for everyone by now knows their barbaric methods of extracting confessions from detainees. All the regime has done is once again displayed its contempt for the women of Iran.

Just came back from a short trip to Slovakia and while I was there also made a trip to Devin, where the heart sculpture by Daniel Brunovský made from barbed wire which originally was used to divide Slovakia from its western neighbour during the Communist rule is located. It was at Devin that the barbed wire was first symbolically cut.

This is by a plaque marking the courage of the Bratislava students in 1989 against the tyranny of Communism outside a university in Bratislava just before boarding the bus to Devin.

Tuesday, December 08, 2009

For the last 50 years, 7th December or 16 Azar in the Iranian calendar, has been a day for Iranian students to mark the fall of their comrades on this day. Not a year has gone by when some form of dissent or protest has not been carried out on this day.

Normally the protests are limited to universities and normally they are held within one or two universities in Tehran. Yesterday however, was an unprecedented day. The protests were supposed to start at 3:00 pm Tehran time [11:30 in the morning UK time], but as early as 7 am in London, I was alerted that the whole thing had kicked off and it wasn't just the students, the people had joined them wherever they could. If they couldn't break through the security surrounding the campuses, they stood outside and chanted along with the students inside.

Moreover, the protests were happening in every university throughout Iran. Soon footage and news came through from Isfahan, Mashad, Tabriz, Hamedan, Kermanshah, Kerman and Sanandaj. The most predominant chant was specifically directed against the Supreme Leader. It was amazing the regime had gone out of its way to prevent any information from coming out of Iran. Apart from the usual tricks, they had banned the press permits for all foreign correspondents for three days and even the public phone boxes around the universities were wrapped in black plastic bags to stop eyewitnesses reporting from the scene, yet once again they failed miserably. As Moussavi aptly said 'They are trying to put up a barbed wire to stop a flood'.

This morning there are reports that the clashes at the Tehran university are still continuing. Moussavi was removed from his work place this morning and taken home. Despite all the brutality by the regime the movement remains peaceful and non violent.

The footage is from Vanak district, 10 pm Tehran time tonight. Tomorrow marks Iran's National Student Day and Iran's brave students are preparing for another day of protests against Ahmadienjad's coup administration.

Mir Hussein Moussavi asked the people to once again show their solidarity with the students by shouting protest chants from their roof tops and the people have responded. Press permits have been revoked from tomorrow until the 9th December. Internet has been ground to a halt and has been on and off constantly all day from today. All this futile effort by the regime to control the flaw of information and stop the world from seeing the brutality of an archaic regime which does not belong to this day and age and is not fit to rule over the people of Iran.

Regime's efforts will prove once again all in vain and they will only discredit themselves in the eyes of the world. As Moussavi said, 'they are trying to put up barbed wire fences to stop a flood'.

This is a wedding with a difference. Payman Aref is an imprisoned student who is currently one of those on show trial. Hence he can not be present on his wedding day. The bride and the bridegroom's family however have been welcomed in Karroubi the lion heart's home and the wedding ceremony is performed by Karroubi himself, while Payman had a one minute opportunity for a telephone conversation from prison.

Friday, December 04, 2009

In an interview with Deutche Welle Radio, Iranian lawyer, Nasrin Sotoodeh objected to the death sentences handed out to two of her clients, Ayub Porkaar and Reza Khademi.

Sotoodeh said Ayub Porkaar, who served for four years as a fighter jet pilot during the Iran-Iraq was fired after the war because of his criticisms of the military and the government. He was sentenced to death for being a member of the MeK but Sotoodeh denied this charge was ever proven.

Her other client, 23 year old Reza Khademi, was arrested in his house in Afsarieh district, on eday after the election results. Sotoodeh said Khademi was sentenced to death because he was identified in a picture flying a green balloon.

A handful of government organised Baseej 'students' demonstrated outside the British embassy in Tehran demanding the return of Dr.Arsh Hejazi, whom they have charged [not even accused any more] as Neda's killer! See : http://www.farsnews.com/newstext.php?nn=8809111532

They also staged a pathetic street theatre show in which one Baseeji played the role of the BBC reporter, Jon Leyene, filming Neda's death while another Baseeji played the role of Arash Hejazi, who according to them is supposed to be an MI6 agent who shot Neda in the back with the help of another unknown accomplice!!

In response to all this, Neda's mother burst into tears and said 'Enough is enough, They killed my daughter and now they are performing this masquerade. They tried to pressure me into silence and once they even let it slip that they have footage of me and my daughter in previous protests. This shows they had targeted my daughter and they killed her on purpose, now they are setting up this theatre outside the British embassy'

Neda's mother also said she was detained for several hours and threatened during the 4th November protests. 'I want to scream and shout you killed my daughter, what do you want from her now? For God's sake stop'

Thursday, December 03, 2009

If you were in Iran and someone paid you a pound for every time you heard the word martyr or read the word martyr on posters and billboards and newspapers you would come back a wealthy person. So much so that you may be sick of hearing the sacred word of martyr because the way it is exploited for a certain political agenda.

Hamid and his brother Mehdi Bakeri are two venerated Iranian martyrs of the war against Saddam's invasion. They died serving at the front, defending Iran. Mehdi Bakeri even returned to the front after he lost one eye in a battle. Their heroic deeds are stuff of legends and this is too short a space to mention their full account.

Here is Hamid Bakeri's daughter, Assieh Bakeri, speaking at a conference held by the Law Faculty Baseej students and this is what she says:

'My uncle was a polite man, you never heard him swear, he did not lie, he did not accuse others, when he did something, he did not blow his trumpet and say to everyone I did this ...Who says my father and my uncle wanted to impose their will on others? my aunts, my father's family were all free to choose how they wanted to think, how they wanted to dress. They loved all their daughters regardless, not because one had a strand of hair sticking out and the other didn't..you say you respect my father and uncle, look what they did to us when I spoke out...' Then she talks about how Ahamdienjad's billionaire interior minister, Sadegh Mahsouli, in the last disputed election, mistreated her father when Mahsouli was in charge of the revolutionary guards in Oroumieh, North West Iran. She continues 'No one knew my father and my uncle better than my family, If my father and my uncle were alive today, they would not have tolerated these atrocities carried out in the name of the martyrs by the Baseej against the people today. If they were alive today they would be in prison now' and with that she leaves the podium after a mixed reception.

So there we have it, so much for the regime's exploitation of our beloved martyrs who if they were alive today would no doubt once again stood by the people of Iran and defended them.

Tuesday, December 01, 2009

This man in the picture with plastic bags covering his feet is Mohammad Ali Ramin, Ahmadinejad's pro-Nazi advisor with dubious contacts with neo-Nazi parties in Germany. The callous murder of the pregnant Egyptian mother, Marwa Al-Sherbini, in a German courtroom, in front of her husband and child, was committed by a Russian Nazi supporter of one of the parties Ramin is close to.

Ramin is believed to be the one who convinced Ahmadinejad the holocaust never happened. He is currently the deputy Minister for Press Affairs in the Guidance Ministry

So why is Ramin wearing plastic bags on his feet? The picture is taken after he attended Kordan's funeral ceremony. Kordan was the former Ministry of Interior in Ahmadinejad's cabinet who had faked his Oxford PHD and had a rape record prior to the 1979 revolution . Ramin's shoes were stolen as he came out of the mosque. One can only imagine the kind of characters who attended Kordan's ceremony!

This is supposed to be a meeting between a member of the Council for Student Grants from the Science Ministry in the Islamic Republic Embassy in Paris with a group of Iranian students who are receiving grants. The students however are not interested to talk about their grants, instead they want to tell the Science Ministry representative that they support their student colleagues in Iran and the Green Movement. Until a few months ago these students would have been the last to challenge the authorities and risk receiving their grants, yet look at them, so resolute and defiant with their powerful arguments that the Ministry representative just doesn't know how to answer them. The two Baseej students sitting opposite them can't do anything either other than look vindictive and stupid.

'..We are not indifferent to what is happening to our classmates in Iran..we can not tolerate what is happening to our classmates in Iran, but no matter how much violence you throw at us our protests will be peaceful and we will not respond in any other way...The way you have dealt with dissent is so unprecedented that you have disgraced Iran...what makes you think you are in the position of the prophet to decide what people can read and what people can think?...why do a minority think they have the right to tell us who we can choose and to have the right to veto if we choose from who they tell us to choose from and they still don't like who we have chosen?...you can not blame the students for voicing their protests, look at what you have done and understand why it has come to this. How can you call it a Ministry of Science when you repress science and the appointed Minister of Science has such a dubious track record? obviously the head of the coup junta has appointed him to further antagonise the students, the Minister says the university lecturers should be more supervised. How much more?...We love our country, we are Iranian but in our country as soon as a student protests he is accused of being this and that..We love our country, Iran is not just yours, its ours too, our fathers and our forefathers have been Iranian, how can you tell us we don't have the right to live in our country and not have the right to think in our country? Iran belongs to all of us, let it be free, if you think your nation are a learned nation then let them choose...'

'...we say these things knowing what the consequences for us may be but we can not remain silent after what has happened to our friends or what is happening to our people inside the country, Commander Jazayeri of the Revolutionary Guards audaciously threatened us as activists outside Iran, they say the activists outside Iran who are supporting the movement inside Iran will be dealt with, in the past you didnt say it publicly just did it, now you have become so audacious that you declare your threats publicly ... I repeat we belong to our homeland and we love our country, we do not consider our country to belong to any specific group or sect, Iran belongs to all Iranians from all walks and thoughts and religions, we are neither connected to any foreign powers nor are we deviants, no, we are human beings, we have the ability to think, we will continue until both you will be free to say what you want to say and we too will be able to live free and think...we love Iran, it belongs to all of us, we will die for Iran and we will fight any group who want to take over and impose their way of thinking upon the rest....Ever since we were seven years old you told us at schools that the Shah did this and the Shah did that, we grow up we reach maturity and see everything you say the Shah did, you are doing yourselves today but in the name of religion and much worse with more brutality...'

About Me

Follow Me on Twitter @potkazar
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Last time I was in Iran, was during the Islamic "cultural revolution". I hated what was taking place in front of my eyes.
Illiterate gangs of thugs attacking students and academics and telling them how a university must be run! Book stalls being attacked, with books torn up and burned.
I knew then that I had to do something to get rid of this scourge of clerics who had seized power in Iran.
My main objective in life is to help establish a secular democracy in Iran.
I believe the best way forward for Iran to be based on four pillars of Democracy, Secularism, Nationalism and Meritocracy.
Most countries that have adopted these principles have been prosperous, why shouldn't our people be one of them?